I have been working on this site about my Irish ancestors for some time now without knowing anything about Blogging as such.

This is my first attempt and it will be fairly brief.

I'm not exactly sure I'm doing it all properly but shall no doubt learn by experience.

Recently I have been looking into the townland in Armagh that my Morgan ancestors most probably came from. Unfortunately Australian certificates only list county names and not townland names. So going with "West Armagh" and parents Alexander Morgan and Agnes Lennon from his marriage certificate I began my search for more information on my great great grandfather, John Morgan.

Eventually, in the Roman Catholic records, I found his baptism for 30th June 1829 at Derrynoose in Armagh. It helped that there was only the one Alexander Morgan. John's parents on his baptism record were Alexander Morgan and Nancy Lennon. The names Nancy, Agnes and Anne are all interchangeable and often all were used at different times and in different records for the same person.

In the Griffiths Valuation for Armagh (1864) there was one Alexander Morgan who was leasing land from Andrew J Crawford at Rowan, Derrynoose. There were quite a few other Morgans around the same area.I don't doubt they were connected, I just haven't found how as yet. John Morgan's first son was named Francis Edward Morgan. There were 2 Francis Morgans living near Alexander. It's possible that John named his first born after his own grandfather and his second son was Alexander after his own father. Not strictly sticking to the traditional naming pattern but fairly close.

John Morgan named his Essendon hotel "Cross Keys". There was an area named Cross Keys only about 5 miles from Derrynoose. As with Rowan, Cross Keys now just seems to be a road rather than a townland I think.

I had no idea it was so easy to create a free blog here at Weebly, thanks.

Reply

Peter Morgan

2/14/2013 08:11:15 am

Hi, My grandfather, Peter Morgan was raised in what is referred to as House 8 Rowan, Derrynoose, Armagh -see 1901,1911 census. Also, see the references in griffiths to ~8 households in Rowan, Derrynoose in 1864, including Alexander. Any luck in finding out childrens names for Alexander?

HI Peter, thanks so much for making contact. From the Google map it looks to me like there are two Rowan Roads running parallel with each other from Fergort Rd. A bit confusing. Do you live in the area? Would all the Morgans in that area would be related? I haven't found any new information beside what I have already put in my site here about Alexander Morgan's children. I can't even really yet confirm that they are one and the same Alexander, but then I haven't found any other Alexander Morgan as yet. All I have had to go on is information from Australian records and trying to match Irish RC baptisms to the 3 Morgan siblings who came to Australia. You can contact me direct on geekaytay@gmail.com

Reply

Caroline

4/12/2015 07:59:13 pm

My great great grandmother was Ann Morgan from fergort in derrynoose. Her marriage certificate shows her father as miles Morgan. She lived in Rowan after getting married.

Reply

Kerryn

9/12/2016 02:44:53 pm

Caroline I must have missed your comment. Do you know if Miles had any siblings?

Reply

Caroline

9/17/2016 03:04:01 am

I am trying to find that out at the minute. The records don't really go back much further. Miles wife was Ann Lennon so there could also be a connection there also. I have been stuck at Miles Morgan and Ann Lennon for a while trying to see if they had siblings. Sponsors at baptism are usually a good place to start, but is hard to tie them all together.

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Kerryn Taylor

My great great grandparents John and Alice Morgan and their family had the original Cross Keys Hotel at Essendon for many years. This site is dedicated to them.